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Building A Life Worth Living

This summer I turned 21. It was an age I never thought I’d reach. But here I am, after a decade spent in the cloud of mental illness, just now beginning to emerge on the other side.

I was a pre-teen when things began to change. Anger arrived, along with anxiety and depression. I felt so alone, betrayed by my friends who embraced puberty’s changes. By age 15 I was suicidal, self-harming, and restricting what I ate. I used these behaviors to cope with overwhelmingly strong emotions. I felt like a terrible person for every little thing I did and thought punishment was only fitting. Feeling sad? Restrict. Feeling angry or ashamed? Self-harm. I was also dealing with acute social anxiety that prevented me from speaking with strangers and acquaintances. My mind was constantly obsessing over every little thing. I was sure people were laughing at me constantly. It was at this age that I saw my first therapist and started my first medication, which greatly helped my anxiety. However my depression continued to worsen.

BRIDGES to Summer

Summer is a frame of mind.—Roy Clarke

Summer: the season of sauna and sassafras tea; time for fans and flights to faraway spots, for A/C and I.C (Air Conditioning and Ice Cream); time to drink in the yellow nectar that pours forth from the giant yellow star that saves the hurtling planet on which we live from being another bleak rock.

In summer, the sun is all too hot, all too real. It is a truth we cannot blink away. Summer makes us honest.

May You Be Blessed By Your Mess

Let me introduce myself: I'm a daughter, wife, mother and grandmother (call me GiGi, please). I'm a City girl who grew up in a stable, loving two parent home. I’m college educated, and married my high school sweetheart. I enjoyed a great career in sales and marketing before becoming a full-time Mom to two great children, girl and boy, respectively. Early in our careers, we moved around quite a bit, on the average, every 18 months. We were climbing the proverbial corporate ladder, but as the children got older, we settled in our hometown and soon church, social, school and family activities were all-consuming. Kids’ ballgames and family get-togethers were one right after the other. It was great, babysitters ON CALL! Charmed Life.

BRIDGES

We have a gift for you. It doesn’t need batteries, but it may energize you.

We have a gift for you. It won’t purr, but it may be comforting.

We have a gift for you. It has no calories, but it may enrich you.

The gift is BRIDGES - Building Recovery of Individual Dreams and Goals through Education and Support, a program of classes and support groups exclusively conducted by and for individuals with mental health diagnoses.

MHA of Eastern MO is the exclusive provider of BRIDGES in Missouri.

BRIDGES Crossings Classes - ten weeks, one class weekly, two hours each - explore diagnoses, treatments, medications, self-advocacy, communication, strengths, hope and success with people living with a mental illness.

BRIDGES Support Groups - one year, one session weekly, up to two hours each - explore strengths, coping, treatments, medications, self-advocacy, communication, hope and success with people who have a mental illness diagnoses, whether receiving treatment or not.

Making the Most of Support Groups

sup•port
1. to bear or hold up (a load, mass, structure, part, etc.); serve as a foundation for
2. to sustain or withstand (weight, pressure, strain, etc.) without giving way; serve as a prop for
3. to undergo or endure, especially with patience or submission; tolerate
4. to sustain (a person, the mind, spirits, courage, etc.) under trial or affliction: They supported him throughout his ordeal.
5. to maintain (a person, family, establishment, institution, etc.) by supplying with things necessary to existence; provide for: to support a family

It is a human condition to want to connect with like-minded individuals. A support group allows you to share openly with others whose experiences may be similar and who can validate or relate to what you are going through. Additionally, the other individuals may be able to offer insight, understanding and a “sounding board” for frustrations.

The Power of Film

In a scene familiar to many movie lovers, Melvin appears at Carol’s Brooklyn apartment in the middle of the night. He is a writer trying to escape his isolated existence and struggling mightily with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. His visit is another attempt to woo Carol, a waitress who has seen him at his worst and is skeptical about the possibility of a romantic relationship between them.

Melvin: It feels a little confined here. Let's take a walk.Carol: See… it's four in the morning. A walk sounds a little screwy to me, if you don't mind.Melvin: If you need an excuse, there's a bakery on the corner. There's a shot it'll open soon. That way we're not screwy—we’re just two people who like warm rolls.Carol: [facial expression softens] Okay.

Too Many Walls; Not Enough BRIDGES

Sir Isaac Newton wrote, “We build too many walls and not enough bridges.” And I see too many walls as I travel: the graffiti-spattered, tumbledown rubble of industrial graveyards; the whitewashed stretches of sanitary sepulchers; the peach concrete of fleur-de-lis flyovers. And I see, in my mind’s eye, as I listen, too many walls within my peers: “I am my illness”; “I am not capable;” “I am nothing”. Yes, walls protect and defend, but they obscure and isolate. They filch light and rob air. They are not free, nor do they promote freedom.

A History of Caring: Honoring Police Officers Who Show Compassion in the Midst of Crisis

Compassion is something deep inside. An act of the heart and not of the mind. A way of being open to another person. Every year, we honor officers in the St. Louis area who demonstrate compassion in the midst of responding to a psychiatric crisis. These officers go above and beyond the call of duty to treat people with mental illness as individuals – as people with thoughts, feelings and lives – beyond that one moment in time. We recognize these compassionate men and women with the 26th Annual John J. McAtee Police Recognition Luncheon.

Blurring the Lines - JD's Story

My feelings are stuck in my head…I feel like I can’t get the feelings out…

It was April 2008. JD Dehne felt like he had everything in the world a 25-year-old could want: a loving family, a new wife, a house. The next day would be the culmination of several years of study – an art show to earn his MFA from Fontbonne University. It was four years after his dad had died, and he’d taken over the family business, as well as doing his art.

That morning, JD tried to take his life. His family had no idea what he was feeling. He’d managed to hide his mixed-up feelings from everyone he knew. They didn’t know until they found him overdosed on medications and took him to the hospital. He spent a few days in ICU. JD had been feeling dramatically depressed, wasn’t sleeping and had suicidal thoughts.

Home Sweet Home - The Grand Warner Mansion

One of the cool things about my job at Mental Health America is coming and going from our amazing building on South Grand at Shaw. There’s just something neat about an old house. The outside really pushes a person to think about what’s inside. Once the home for lumber baron Erastus Warner and his family, the Warner Mansion was built with loving detail.